Monday, March 18, 2013

Smile, plague and raindrops

Smile, damn you smile. This smile I capture from a poster outside an orthodontist. I am sure that is perfectly genuine. But judging by the price list beneath it is an expensive smile. Smiles should be natural and spontaneous, should be generous and cost nothing. I always suspected service industries which instruct staff to smile at customers. A smile which is not generated by natural sympathy and pleasure can be chilling. Better a scowl that is is sincere than a false smile.
"Oh villain, villain smiling damnèd villain...
...That one may smile and smile and be a villain....
Hamlet is right.

I begin to read an article about the arrival of Bubonic Plague, The black Death in Europe in 1348. It describes the symptoms. I quickly stop reading it.

To capture an image of the unceasing rain of the last four or five days I stop to photograph raindrops strung from the branches of a silver birch by the roadside. And quickly put my camera away to stop it getting wet.

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About Me

Compasses

Following their Handbook for Explorers collaboration on the Compasses site (link below), Lucy Kempton and I are working together on a new venture, Questions. This is a series of poems submitted by each of us alternately, and prompted in the case of each poem by the previous poem and a new question. It is a process of adventure and discovery. Join us for the ride.http://www.compasses-lucyandjoe.blogspot.com/